This invention relates to improvements in the manufacture of wooden beams and relates particularly to improved methods and apparatus for manufacturing wooden beams with butt-joined or spliced timber lengths.
In many applications in the building industry, it is necessary to provide lengths of timber of substantial width and length in relation to thickness, for use as structural beams, floor joists, lintel beams, roof beams, rafters and the like.
With present day timber shortages and environmental control regulations, it is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain desired solid timber in wide sections and long lengths, and of particular in defect-free quality.
In the past it has been known to provide spliced beams by edge gluing two or more separate lengths of timber. It has also been known to butt-join timber lengths using known nail plates on either side of the lengths of timber to be joined and/or by machining interlocking formations, such as dovetail formations, in the ends of the timber lengths to be butt-jointed. Experience has shown that spliced beams and butt-joined beams formed by these known methods are unsatisfactory and uneconomic, and such beams are generally usable only for substantially load-free applications.